Vegan Raspberry Macarons

Hello! Join me today to make these Vegan Raspberry Macarons, using the French method. These Vegan Raspberry Macarons are filled with a vegan raspberry buttercream and raspberry jam.

Also make sure to watch the video on this page or on YouTube showing you exactly how to make these awesome vegan macarons!

It’s been a while now since I started making vegan macarons, and a lot has changed since then. First the fact that I began making vegan macarons using the Italian. And now I use the French method.

There’s so much I’ve learned since I started, and I am here to share all of my vegan macaron knowledge with you.

Head over to Macaron School where I post lots of articles on troubleshooting, beginners guides, and a lot of information that can help you master macarons.

If mastering vegan macarons is something you are striving to do, I am going to give you one of the most valuable tips today on this Vegan Raspberry Macaron post. And a mistake I see a lot of people make everyday.

I get messages daily on my instagram dms, facebook messages, emails, comments on the blog, with people asking for my help to troubleshoot their macarons. And when it comes to vegan macarons, the main mistake I see is over mixing the batter.

Over mixing the batter during the macaronage phase (mixing dry ingredients with the meringue) is by far the easiest thing to “mess up” when making vegan macarons.

Over mixing the batter will cause the feet of the macaron to explode and expand in the oven, the tops of the macarons will flatten out, and you will end up with results less than satisfactory.

Often times that could be due to an oven issue. Here on my Vegan Matcha Macarons post I cover a lot of the oven science, and how to optimize your oven for vegan macarons. And for a more comprehensive guide, visit this post: Understanding your Oven (Macaron Tips).

Also check out my full Vegan Macaron Troubleshooting Guide.

Anyway, back to the over mixing issue.

If you are used to making regular egg white macarons, you will be surprised about how much less you have to fold the batter during the macaronage process.

It doesn’t take much to over mix vegan macaron batter. Which is why it’s so important to focus and mix as minimally as possible.

On my video for these Vegan Raspberry Macarons I am showing the macaronage in full, without any edits, cuts, and without speeding it up. Real time macaronage, so you can see how little the batter needs to be folded.

Make sure to watch my videos, they can be so helpful and I try to include a lot of tips as I walk you through the process.

And when mastering macarons, the video aspect is such an important tool that can help you accelerate your amazing results.

The batter should not be flowing continuously off the spatula, it should actually be quite thick, and still break up in chunks if you try to lift a spatula full of batter and let it drip back into the bowl.

Unlike when you make regular egg white macarons, where you are looking for a lava consistency, if you let the vegan macarons reach ribbon stage, they will for sure be over mixed, and the feet will expand in the oven.

So the fix is to simply stop stirring before reaching the lava stage, or ribbon consistency, but it might take a couple of tries to get it right.

Again, broke record: watch those videos! Not even just mine, there are other fabulous bloggers and recipe writers out there that post so much valuable content that can be extremely helpful.

I should also say that this Vegan Raspberry Buttercream that I used to fill the Vegan Raspberry Macarons is one of the most delicious things in the whole world.

I used freeze dried raspberry powder to make it.

And I use this powder in many other recipes. If you don’t have use for such a big container of freeze dried raspberry powder, you can simply get one little bag of this, and process the freeze dried raspberries in a food processor. Just one of these little bags will do.

Freeze dried raspberries (and strawberries) are great snacks too, so I usually get them for my son, since they are his favorite, and they are a healthy snack, without any added sugar, etc.

Totally recommend them. Freeze dried berries will shake up your world, specially your baking world, since they are so easy to add to frostings, cakes, etc, without altering the consistency.

Whenever I used to make raspberry or strawberry buttercream, and I would add jam or preserves to the recipe, my buttercream would curdle, or get a weird consistency. With the powder, that doesn’t happen, and you get the wonderful taste of the delicious berries.

And for the middle of the macarons I used a delicious store-bought raspberry jam.

I really hope you enjoyed today’s recipe. Here are some more vegan macaron recipes you may like:

• Vegan Matcha Macarons
• Vegan Strawberry Macarons
• Vegan Chocolate Macarons
• Vegan Coffee Macarons
• Vegan Blueberry Lemon Macarons
• Vegan Vanilla Macarons
• Vegan Biscoff Macarons
• Vegan Pistachio Macarons

Also check out my Vegan Macaron Guide for beginners, plus lots of other information such as Troubleshooting guides, more tips and articles here at Macaron School.

Thank you so much for reading my blog, I hope you enjoyed my Vegan Raspberry Macarons. If you make them, do comment below and tag me on instagram, I love hearing from you and checking out your creations! Have a great day!

Vegan Raspberry Macarons

Camila Hurst

Vegan Raspberry Macarons made using the French Method, filled with vegan raspberry buttercream and raspberry jam.

5 from 2 votes

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 2 hours hrs

Cook Time 40 minutes mins

Total Time 2 hours hrs 40 minutes mins

Course Dessert

Cuisine American, vegan

Servings 30 macarons

Calories 145 kcal

Ingredients

  

Vegan Macaron Shells

• 110 grams almond flour
• 110 grams  powdered sugar
• 75 grams aquafaba
• 1/4 tsp  cream of tartar
• 66 grams granulated sugar

Vegan Raspberry Buttercream

• 4 tbsp vegan butter 56 grams
• 1 cup powdered sugar sifted 125 grams
• 3 tbsp powdered freeze dried raspberry 19 grams

To assemble

• 1/4 cup raspberry jam
• 1 drop pink food coloring
• 1/4 -1/2 tsp clear liquor I used rum

Instructions

 

Vegan Macaron Shells

• Gather all of the ingredients before starting to make the macarons. Measure out the almond flour, powdered sugar, aquafaba, cream of tartar, and granulated sugar.
• Line two baking sheets with silicone mats or parchment paper.
• And fit a large piping bag with a round tip.
• Sift the almond flour and the powdered sugar together. Set aside.
• Place the aquafaba in the bowl of a mixer.
• Start whipping on low speed and add the cream of tartar.
• Whip for about 30 seconds, until the aquafaba starts getting white and thick.
• Raise the speed to medium and continue to whip for another minute or so, until you are able to see streaks left by the whisk on the aquafaba.
• At this point, raise the speed to high, and start to add the granulated sugar, slowly, a bit at a time.
• Continue to whip until the aquafaba achieves stiff peaks.
• The whole whipping, from beginning to end, should last about 10 minutes. It might take more or less time depending on your mixer, and on the aquafaba. If I am using my hand mixer, the whipping time can even take about 20 minutes.
• Stop whipping when the peaks are shooting straight up.
• Add the sifted dry ingredients to the whipped aquafaba. Start folding with a spatula slowly.
• Add food coloring at this point, if using any. For these macarons, I didn’t add any food coloring.
• Fold the batter forming a letter J with the spatula.
• Fold until the batter is flowing slightly. You don’t want the batter to be flowing continuously off the spatula. When it comes to vegan macarons, the folding time is very very brief. You are basically just looking to incorporate the dry ingredients with the meringue. Please watch the video to see what the consistency should look like. If you grab a spatula full of batter and hold it over the bowl, it should still be separating in chunks, and not flowing continuously on a ribbon. Do not get to the ribbons stage! If you get to the ribbon stage, the macaron feet will spread out in the oven.
• Transfer the batter to the piping bag.
• Pipe 1 1/2” circles on a baking sheet lined with silicon mat. I usually use 2 sheets. This will depend on how big you pipe your macarons.
• Slam the trays against the counter to release air bubbles.
• Use a toothpick to pop any remaining bubbles.
• Let the trays rest for 30-45 minutes until the shells are dry. Test this by touching a macaron gently with your finger. Depending on humidity levels and weather, it might take longer or less time for your macarons to dry.
• Pre-heat the oven to 285ºF.
• Bake each tray separately, one tray at a time.
• Bake for a total of 20 minutes, or until the macarons are easily coming off the silicon mat.
• After 5 minutes baking, I rotate the tray to ensure even baking on all sides. Not all bakers have to do this, if your oven has an even heat distribution you may not have to rotate the trays, but if your macarons are coming out lopsided, or if only a few in the tray are cracking, then it’s worth to experiment with rotating the trays during baking.
• After about 8 minutes baking, I also place a piece of foil or parchment paper on top of the macarons, so that they won’t brown as they bake.
• Baking time might vary depending on your oven, consistency of the batter, oven temperature.
• Try to wiggle a macaron, and if it doesn’t feel jiggly, you can remove them from the oven.
• Let the macarons cool down before filling.

Vegan Raspberry Buttercream

• Cream the butter at a medium speed with an electric mixer for 45 seconds, until creamy.
• With the mixer off, add powdered sugar and freeze dried raspberry powder to the bowl. Mix on low until combined.
• Raise speed to medium high and cream for 30 seconds until creamy.
• If you notice the buttercream is too stiff or dry, add a bit of non-dairy milk, or water, 1 teaspoon at a time.
• If the buttercream is too runny, maybe the butter is too hot, in that case, cover the bowl and insert it in the fridge for 5 minutes. If the butter is room temperature, then maybe you need to add more powdered sugar to the buttercream.

To assemble

• Pipe a ring of buttercream around the edges of each bottom shell. Fill the middle with a little bit of jam. Top with another shell.

For the decoration

• Place a drop of pink food coloring in a small bowl, add about 1/4 tsp of clear liquor such as vodka or rum, don’t worry, it will evaporate and you won’t be able to taste it.
• Mix the food coloring until it dissolves. Grab a brush and dab it in the dissolved food coloring. Then, making quick motions, stroke the brush against the teeth of the fork, to create speckles on the shells of the macarons.

Storage

• Make sure to let macarons mature in the fridge for 24-48 hours before serving. They will have a much better consistency and flavor. Let the macarons sit at room temperature for 10 minutes before enjoying.
• These will keep for quite a while. You can keep them in the refrigerator for 1 week, or in the freezer for up to a month.

Notes

Aquafaba is the water you obtain from cooking chickpeas (or other legumes). The aquafaba I use is water drained from a chickpea can. I prefer low or no sodium chickpea water, mainly because of the taste, I feel like the salted chickpea water adds a weird taste to meringues and such. Some people like to boil their own chickpeas to obtain the aquafaba, and you can do that, but make sure to study what are the best ratios water:chickpeas so your aquafaba is concentrated enough

Aquafaba: I used to reduce the aquafaba before. But lately, I haven’t been reducing it anymore, and it works just fine. If you do want to reduce the aquafaba, place 150 grams of aquafaba in a small saucepan and bring to a boil, simmer until it reduces to about half. I recommend using the aquafaba straight from the chickpea can.

Macaronage: Do not let the batter reach ribbon stage. If it reaches ribbon stage it will be over mixed, the batter is supposed to be thick. Watch my videos on YouTube to see what it should look like.

Thick batter: If the batter is too thick while mixing, add a teaspoon of aquafaba as you mix, until you obtain the perfect consistency.

Oven thermometer: Please make sure to have an oven thermometer! I receive a lot of troubleshooting questions and the great majority are issues caused due to not having an oven thermometer.

Oven temperature: Please experiment with your own oven temperature. Temperatures will vary depending on your oven and technique. It’s important to experiment and see what works best for your own oven. In my old oven I used to bake this same recipe at 310ºF. However, with my new oven, I bake it at 285ºF. This comes to show that the temperature will vary greatly depending on your own oven. Please experiment and find out what works best for you.

Troubleshooting: if your macarons are exploding, flattening out, with the feet spreading to the sides, that can mean a few things:

1- hot oven (make sure to have oven thermometer and experiment with the optimal oven temperature for your oven).

2- over mixed batter. It’s really easy to over mix vegan macaron batter. Mix it just until it starts to flow. Watch the videos on my youtube channel for reference.

3- under whipped meringue: make sure the meringue has really stiff peaks. It can take some time. Just be patient.

Keyword macarons, raspberries, vegan macarons